My surprise

What has surprised me most about adoption so far?  What has surprised me the very most is how this little guy has been able to worm his way into my heart so fast.  I knew parents of adopted children loved their adopted children just as much as biological children.  I've seen that.  We have several friends who have adopted and I know we all have that capacity- to love someone elses child in that deep gut wrenching, all encompassing, all consuming way.  I didn't know how fast and how profoundly I'd love him, especially when I don't really even "know" him yet.  I didn't know he would soon dominate my thoughts, my worries. my prayers. 

Maybe it's born out of need. He most definitely needs us, and he needs us fast.  He needed us yesterday.  He needs us like my biological children have never needed anything in their whole life.  This little boy, who aside from possibly his caretakers in the orphanage who have cared for his physical needs, has really had no one to love him, and yet I am prepared to move heaven and hell to get to him.  He has no idea. He doesn't even know I exist. He won't, until we get in country.  He continues to wait. To wait for love, for a mama and a papa. He waits, while we pray and worry and fret and cry and fill out paperwork... Pray the next six months passes quickly.  This little boy needs many things.  Family is the greatest of all. 

My new motto: "There is an instinct in a woman to love most her own child - and an instinct to make any child who needs her love, her own." ~Robert Brault